Posted
by
timothyon Tuesday March 26, 2013 @09:22AM
from the spearguns-would-be-good dept.

An anonymous reader writes "As reported by Slashdot, Nokia recently notified the IETF that its RFC 6386 video codec (aka VP8, released by Google under a BSD license with a waiver of that company's patent rights) infringed several dozen of its patents; furthermore, Nokia was not inclined to license them under FRAND (fair, reasonable, and non-discriminating) terms. While the list provided by Nokia looks intimidating, Pamela Jones at Groklaw discovered that many appeared to be duplicates except for the country of filing; and even within a single country (e.g. the U.S.), some appeared to be overlapping. In other words, there may be far fewer distinct patented issues than what appears on Nokia's IETF form. Thom Holwerda at OSNews also weighed in, recalling another case where sweeping patent claims by Qualcomm and Huawei against the Opus open source audio codec proved to be groundless FUD. The familiar name Florian Mueller pops up again in Holwerda's article."

Nonsense, if Google offered a couple of billion, Nokia would take it yesterday. Nokia had to sell off its headquarters because they were cash strapped.

Everything has a price and this is just posturing to extract the maximum price possible. To add some conspiracy to this is just Groklaw and Slashdot trying to rile up the masses with FUD to score page hits.

Note that Nokia is declaring the patents *during* the standardization process, instead of waiting a couple of years for it to get on a few hundred million

Why should google payoff a company without proof it infringes, or do you believe everything you read and when someone says it is infringed it has to be infringed.
As for why they are doing it now, it is because it becomes harder to submarine a standard if you are part of the process, or a practicing entity.

Why should google payoff a company without proof it infringes, or do you believe everything you read and when someone says it is infringed it has to be infringed.

I didn't say it infringed. It's the linked articles that are claiming that Nokia should give up the patents for free and to do otherwise is FUD and that the patents don't infringe because Qualcomm's patent claims didn't work out in the case of Opus.

"Why should google payoff a company without proof it infringes"Two good reasons:- The cost to pay them off can be less than the legal costs of fighting, espicially if they manage to get an injunction.- Even if it is blatantly obvious to anyone in the industry that the patents are junk, judges are not technical experts, so there is always some element of risk.

Florian, that simply isn't true. There is no indication that VP8 is patent-encumbered. That is just FUD you are trying to spread. When you say "we", I presume you mean Microsoft, and of course you have rose-tinted glasses. How did Google lie? They didn't. Are you trying that old fallacy of trying to trick somebody into proving a negative?

Over the last few decades, Nokia has spent more money in R&D than almost any other company in the world.

They do spend quite a lot but they're not top of the heap even just in technology companies. IBM [google.com], and Microsoft [google.com] both spend considerably more on research.

Nokia has spent roughly $4-5 billion [google.com] per year but it's been dropping steadily from about $5B in 2009 down to about $3.7B last year. A very substantial sum to be sure but not out of line with other large tech companies and they've been forced to spend steadily less due to their financial position. Kind of amazing that they can't seem to develop a hit phone when they spend 5X what Apple does on R&D. Makes you wonder what the heck they are doing.

> Kind of amazing that they can't seem to develop a hit phone when they spend 5X what Apple does on R&D. Makes you wonder what the heck they are doing.

Actually we recently had this discussion.:-) Two anonymous cowards posted these beautiful summaries which points out the main difference between Apple and other companies that I believe is the key reason:

Nokia is not a design company. They're an engineering company. Which to start, means that their phones probably would turn out more like Linux than OSX.

That having been said, Nokia's R&D also is more engineering-focused. Hardware, signals processing, accessibility, etc. They'll be trying to cram a large swiss army knife worth of tools into a phone, or coming up with new antenna designs to improve signal transmission and reception, or finding new materials to make lighter, thinner phone casings.

They make most of their money selling phones. As such they are a consumer electronics company. Nokia doesn't make the majority of their money selling engineering. They may have an engineering culture but that isn't the same thing. Similarly Apple is a consumer electronics company that arguably has a design culture.

(Actually you can make a very credible argument that Apple really is a software company that bundles their software with nicely designed commodity hardware. One could put Android on an iPhone

Didn't Nokia also make a bunch of money selling cell towers and other network stuff?

Yes. About half their revenue comes from cell phones and related products and about half comes from infrastructure via Nokia Siemens Networks which is a 50/50 joint venture. They have a third division for their mapping technology (NAVTEQ) but its revenue is relatively inconsequential at about 1/10th the size of the other two divisions. The infrastructure division is relatively profitable though joint ventures tend to be unstable in the long run. (commonly the partners eventually have differing goals and

Of course does the list contain duplicates. Patents are usually limited to specific jurisdictions. Patents granted by the US patent office are only valid in the US. That is why companies file the same patent in many jurisdictions. That does not make the list less intimidating, because for VP8 to be free they still need to be invalidated individually in many courts around the world. Just take a look at the recent case of Microsoft vs Motorola for how tricky this is. A US judge agrees with Microsoft, while a German judge agrees with Motorola.

The point is, that if the patents all only cover one or two things, then you only need to do one or two things to get around the patents. It also means that there's only one or two things to try and invalidate, be it through prior art, obviousness or whatever.

That's a much easier task than working around or fighting 89 or whatever distinct patents. Stating there are 89 patents overstates the relevance of them for no other reason than fear mongering because there aren't 89 or whatever different patents per se, just one or two different patents, filed in 30 odd jurisdictions or whatever the actual numbers are.

For things like VP8 which we wish to standardize and be patent free, there should be some process for giving patent holders a limited amount of time to come forward with their grievances so that we don't get so far into the process before we decide we have to drop the whole project because of an existing patent. I think this should probably exist for all things, but especially things we want to be patent free. It really bothers me when somebody has been selling a product 2 or 3 years, and then somebody comes around with a patent that's 10 years old, and then expects them to pay for all the infringing they did over the lifetime of the product. It bothers me so much that I even feel bad for companies like Sony when it happens to them.

I can see it now. Some mediocre Google engineers are looking through the H.264 spec and trying to copy it as best they can. They struggle with this for a few months

Uh, VP8 actually came from a company called On2 which Google acquired in 2010. Since you don't know anything about the codec's history, I'm not going to take your opinions on the technical merits seriously either.

It really bothers me when somebody has been selling a product 2 or 3 years, and then somebody comes around with a patent that's 10 years old, and then expects them to pay for all the infringing they did over the lifetime of the product.

The exact same extortion is occuring now, threatening podcast producers with some bullshit patent trolling - only *after* it was finally becoming financially viable for the real creative artists.

Of course does the list contain duplicates. Patents are usually limited to specific jurisdictions. Patents granted by the US patent office are only valid in the US. That is why companies file the same patent in many jurisdictions.

That's absolutely correct. However, there's another type of "duplicate" that Groklaw mentions, which is a continuation application:

But even in the US-only context, you see the same title more than once. Those are continuations. What's that?
It's where the really elaborate machinations live, and the submarine patents. It's how you argue with the USPTO when it doesn't approve your patent application or if it does how you keep adding to what you already got approved from the USPTO, something you can do over and over to time indefinite... Sigh. In other words, that's where you try to get more than you had in the beginning, maybe as you see what others are inventing so you can sue them. Blech. I so hate patent law.

Well, of course PJ hates patent law, since her understanding of it is so flawed. In reality, continuation applications are new applications, tied to the parent, that are typically filed to claim an invention in a slightly different way, to fix errors in the claims, or to address other unclaimed aspects of the invention. For example:
1) You claim A+B+C+D+E. The patent office dete

While I don't know law that well, submarine patents are a well-known concept. From your description, they seem impossible. So from your perspective, what are submarine patents, and how do they differ from continuations?

Submarine patent are like submarines. Hiding under the water waiting for the enemy to become entrenched and complacent and then spring to the surface and attack when it is least expected.

If Nokia were to do that, they would wait a couple of years till VP8/WebM gets on hundreds of millions of devices and then start filing patent cases. In this case, they're declaring the standard allegedly infringes their patents and provided a list of patents. As usual, Groklaw exaggerates things to mislead folks and to ra

While I don't know law that well, submarine patents are a well-known concept. From your description, they seem impossible. So from your perspective, what are submarine patents, and how do they differ from continuations?

Submarine patents were a huge problem. Prior to 1995, (a) patent applications were not published until they were issuing, and (b) patents lived for 17 years from issue. So what you could do, if you were an evil sneaky bastard, would be to file an application in, say, 1970, and drag your heels on prosecuting it, asking for various examination delays and extensions. Say it issued in 1980 and published then (to expire in 1997)... You file a continuation application just before it issues, and again drag your he

for VP8 to be free they still need to be invalidated individually in many courts around the world

The EU doesn't enforce software patents in the first place, so there shouldn't be a problem with a WebRTC codec. it's only when implemented in dedicated hardware that the patents might be a concern, and enforcement on that is rare and contentious.

And Google isn't going to be too concerned if VP8 is patent encumbered in Trinidad.

They still charge for the encoder.
Because VP8 is good enough and FREE, is why the big hassle is there.

This is what you owe MPEG LA for the use of a licensed H.264 encoder:

Personal and internal business use: 20 cents a unit, max. Paid by hardware and software manufacturers selling more than 100,000 units each year. Realistically, given the enterprise caps and volume discounts, 10 cents a unit or less.

User pays for content by subscription: Nothing until you have more than 100,000 subscribers.

In other words, such an encoder can never be used to produce CC-BY content. Would you accept a compiler that could not be used to produce GPL code? Then why would you use an encoder that cannot produce Free content?

If you sell individual videos more than 12 minutes long, you play MPEG-LA a royalty of of 2% or $0.02 per sale, whichever is less.If you run a paid subscription service, and you have more than 100,000 subscribers, you pay MPEG-LA a royalty between $0.10 and $0.25 per subscriber per year.If you broadcast your shows on TV, you pay either a one time fee of $2500 for each encoder, or between $0.005 and $0.01 per viewer per year.

If you make your videos available for free (even if they are ad supported) you pay no royalty.If you sell videos less than 12 minutes long you pay no royalty.If you run a subscription service with less than 100,000 subscribers you pay no royalty.

If that "prevents you from becoming a producer", you might want to rethink your business model.

Here's my problem: because H.264 is a patented technology, you can't use it without the permission of the patent holders. So maybe today they are charging a couple of pennies per individual video, but how can I trust that this won't go up significantly tomorrow?

My understanding is that the H.264 patents won't expire until somewhere around 2027 or so. That is a long time to be at the mercy of patent holders.

Also, the technology being patented is a problem for free software projects like Firefox. I would like to see at least one video codec with acceptable performance that free software can use freely. Even if H.264 was licensed free-as-in-beer, there are restrictions on it that make it impossible for free software projects to use.

Google's lawyers spent a long time looking over VP8 before Google tried to set it free. So far no challenges to VP8 have really succeeded (MPEG-LA got some money, but failed to stop VP8 or get royalties, and that really must be considered a failure for MPEG-LA). I'm hoping and expecting that this challenge will, in the end, not succeed either.

If I'm right, what happens? Then VP8 becomes a free, lower-performing alternative to H.264. H.264 retains its status as the favorite codec at Apple, all those mobile devices still have H.264 built-in, and MPEG-LA can still collect the royalties. As you noted in your post, the royalties are not unreasonable.

It will be a similar situation as Vorbis and MP3. I consider Vorbis to be a success; it didn't kill MP3, but it did provide a useful alternative, and it kept the MP3 royalties from getting completely crazy. (Vorbis is actually technically superior to MP3, so I once had hopes it might "win" but it never happened.) I expect a similar story from VP8: it will never displace H.264 as the top format, and years from now people will sneer at it for "failing" to do so... but it will give Google and other companies a bargaining chip when MPEG-LA tries to raise royalties too much. They can make a serious threat to migrate their business away from H.264 and to VP8 if the royalties go too high.

If H.264 really was the only game in town, the industry would have to pay whatever rates MPEG-LA chose to set. And in the end, that means the consumers would pay.

MPEG-LA made a binding agreement that licensing of H.264 decoders would be free forever. They have already said that agreement would also apply to H.265, which is due to be formalized soon. VP8 is only about as efficient as H.264, H.265 is considerably more efficient.

The push for VP8 started when MPEG-LA wanted to charge a fee for licensing the decoder. It's now several years after that became a dead issue. The state of the art of video encoding has moved far past VP8. Why spend so much time and effort on an outdated codec?

They still charge for encoding. Perhaps more importantly, do you think that they made H.264 decoding free out of the goodness of their good little hearts, or because Google called their bluff?

They still charge for encoding. Perhaps more importantly, do you think that they made H.264 decoding free out of the goodness of their good little hearts, or because Google called their bluff?

Neither. Honestly, they did it because that is what the players in the MPEG-LA wanted. They knew that a new standard codec was needed. The knew Microsoft was giving away VC-1 for free, and without a free play-back situation for H.264, the proprietary, single vendor (and arguably better quality) VC-1 would become the standard - remember the Blu-Ray standard allows VC-1 in addition to H.264 and MPEG-2.

H.264 is a great codec. It took a lot to get it up and going and it took a lot to get it standardized and doc

Doesn't Google/YouTube have to still produce H.264 though? Unless you're assuming YouTube will go only VP8. If that's the case then everyone else will have the ability to play it so they can watch their cat videos.I'm not defending their actions, just don't see how YouTube is any different from any other content creator in your scenario.

Google has already announced (but not effectuated) that they will not support H.264 in Chrome in the future, only Ogg and VP8, so, no, they will probably not continue to support H.264 on YouTube. "The One Google Way or Fuck Off" is coming quite soon.

Possibly, on the other hand, if they changed their minds, VP8 makes no sense at all, then it is just a meaningless posturing trying to peddle an inferior product on an unsuspecting public. That'd be insane.

MPEG-LA made a binding agreement that licensing of H.264 decoders would be free forever.

Ah no, if you want to provide an encoder or decoder there are royalties, and even if the recipient has a licensed decoder the sender must pay if you offer a subscription or PPV service. The only thing they've promised is that Internet Broadcast AVC Video like YouTube does not require extra payment for the use of the codec on top of what you've already paid for the decoder (typically through Windows, OS X, Chrome or Flash) and Google has paid for the encoder. P.S. If you do have an AVC encoder, you will typi

anything else requires a special license from MPEG LA and it doesn't come cheap.

You are right, if you sell videos over 12 minutes in length, you have to pay either 2% of the video in licensing fees, or $0.02, whichever is less. That is back-breaking bankruptcy-inducing fees right there. As mentioned above in the thread - if your business model can not support that, you should re-think it. Remember, this is only if you are selling videos some how, and getting paid directly for each one by the person buying it.

If you run a subscription service with more than 100 000 paying subscribers, y

Also, GPUs tend not to be as fixed-function as they used to be. Some of the nastier mobile parts are still pretty inflexible; but Nvidia has certainly been pushing the nearly-general-purpose compute capabilities of their PC line down into their Tegra products, and they probably won't be the only one.

There are certainly a lot of existing and near future parts that are fixed function and will never support anything else; but if the pressure remains, newer fixed function devices might support it, and programmable devices will always be a firmware update away from doing so.

Also, GPUs tend not to be as fixed-function as they used to be. Some of the nastier mobile parts are still pretty inflexible; but Nvidia has certainly been pushing the nearly-general-purpose compute capabilities of their PC line down into their Tegra products, and they probably won't be the only one.

I've been paying a little attention to the possibility of shader-based decoding in the AMD open source drivers since AMD probably can't release UVD specs (their fixed function hardware) and so far it's been a dud, yes certain things are extremely well suited to GPUs and is done in shaders by the proprietary driver as well but other parts run very poor so they've been looking at mixed CPU/GPU solutions but then you have all sorts of latency/memory synchronization issues. In short, if you're not doing it all

In a few months time (aka this year) outside of the USA MP3 is going to be patent free. Even in the USA in a couple of years decoding will be patent free. MP3 is going to be around for a very very long time because there is a huge amount of material encoded in it, so it has momentum and the patents are expiring rapidly.

Uhm.... wow. Seems really wrong somehow. But I think I see what you're trying to say.

"The systems" are in place to support "the thing." The copyright system is in place to support creators of creative works. The patent system is in place to support the creators of inventions. But somehow, there are people who game the system to make the system itself how they make their money.

The systems themselves should be the method by which government protects works of practicing entities. But instead the systems

This is so boring, really. I really consider today's tech industry just a huge pile of fraudulent investor. All these patents fights are over a software algorithm shows that there's no real innovation here: just plain old incremental releases that are developed and researched completely different entities (after a certain size, R&D division is like almost a different company) have nothing patentable on them, not in the original intention behind the whole idea of patents. This whole patent-wars are completely wasteful and useless, but the corporate lobby prevent any attempt of legislation that aim to eliminate corporate patents over trivial matters, so we stuck with these companies spending millions of dollars on lawyers and patent fights, for whose benefit? Lawyer benefit.

There has to be a point where it becomes so unbearable the whole idea of patents must be abolished and any company who participated in this fight must be also dismantled and assets to be redistributed.

You don't seem to understand the point here, do you? In the software world it is perfectly common to come with ideas independently from each other, since the problem space is the same. Patents were invented to protect individual inventors against big corporations. But as it stands now, they are just weapons in the hand of big corporations in general.

It is in the interest of all of us, if the way we store and transmit our documents, videos, audio, whathaveyou in completely free formats, no string attached. A

In the software world it is perfectly common to come with ideas independently from each other

Yes it is. So what. It doesn't apply here. Google simply copied H.264. Really, that's what they did. They haven't even tried to hide it. The stuff in H-264 is to some extent genuine innovation. Google just don't want to pay people for that work. They want to steal it instead.

It is in the interest of all of us, if the way we store and transmit our documents, videos, audio, whathaveyou in completely free formats, no string attached

Why? Because Jesus told you so? If you were correct, where would the TV industry be today? "Sorry, my movies are only watchable on TVs from Sony purchased between 1993 and 2001." Industry standards are there for a r

RTFA. This patent issue has nothing to do with H.264 or its owner (yes, it has an owner, otherwise it couldn't be patented) the MPEG-LA body. Again, the technology wasn't developed or patented by Google, but by On2 before Google bought them off. You claim they are freeloaders, but in fact they paid for the company that owned a bunch of patents that wasn't an issue until Google released it with complete free patent terms.

VP8 isn't not a copy of H.264, but it uses similar technology... surprise, surprise, the

Why, you ask. Well, simply because only a completely free algorithm can become really standard, because they are in the public space. Everybody is allowed to create software/hardware to show them/play them for no charge

Here is a funny fact for you. H.264 is an open industry standard. VP8 is a closed one-company "standard". What benefits us the most?

From what I understand VP8 was based on the reference code for MPEG4 but modified to avoid all known patented methods. That seems inherently risky. Why not instead invest in SNOW or other wavelet encoding methods and leap ahead of the current MPEG standard?